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“Satan’s head is as orthodox as yours; he loves war too”: William Ward’s Lifelong Pacifism

William Ward (1769-1823) printed the Bible into multiple Indian languages and kept the Serampore Mission organized between 1799-1823. Before becoming one of the pioneering personalities of the modern missions movement alongside William Carey, Ward used the medium of the English provincial press to voice evangelical values throughout the English Midlands and Yorkshire. One of his most consistently held convictions evidenced throughout his journalistic and missionary careers was pacifism. He could not bear the thought of consigning another human being to eternal damnation even in the name of just war. While John Wesley was willing to sanction warfare as a legitimate practice for Christians under the direction of a lawful ruler – a typical evangelical pragmatic attitude – Ward was not willing to concede such legitimacy. In this regard, Ward evidenced an almost Quaker(ish) reaction against bloodshed.

This paper seeks to retrieve an entirely overlooked aspect of the life and thought of this overlooked Serampore missionary. Adding his voice to the chorus of Baptist views on such pressing global and ethical issues is important for church history and ethics.

(The quote in the proposed title above appears in Ward’s anonymously published pamphlet in 1796 critiquing the British government’s mishandling of abolition of the slave trade, the war with France, and parliamentary reform.)

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